The Internet of Things [INFOGRAPHIC]

When we think of being connected to the Internet, our minds immediately shift to our computers, phones, and most recently tablets. This week at Cisco live, I shared that in 2008, the number of devices connected to the Internet exceeded the number of people on Earth. That’s right. The infographic below provides a visual representation of the increase in “things” connected to the Internet. Tags: IBSG, infographic, internet, network
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FCC Okays Medical Body NetworksFrom dailywireless: The FCC on Thursday announced plans to set aside a chunk of spectrum for connecting wireless medical devices, reports Reuters. The allocation of spectrum for so-called Medical Body Area Networks (MBANs) is part of the FCC’s push to free up unused spectrum and will be up for a vote at the FCC’s May 24 meeting. With wireless medical devices, doctors could monitor a patient’s vital signs at home or in the hospital via low-cost wearable sensors that are attached to the patient’s body and wirelessly connected to the machines that process and display the data for doctors. TheIEEE 802.15 Task Group 6 (Body Area Network) developed a communication standard optimized for low power devices for operation on, in or around the human body. The Philips Heartcycle, a sensor-embedded shirt measuring heart functions, was announced last year. The medical devices lobby pushed the FCC to give it rights to 40 MHz of frequencies, just below the WiFi band. More info here. Like this:

Judith Butler: Bodies in Alliance and the Politics of the Street | eipcp.netIn the last months there have been, time and again, mass demonstrations on the street, in the square, and though these are very often motivated by different political purposes, something similar happens: bodies congregate, they move and speak together, and they lay claim to a certain space as public space. Now, it would be easier to say that these demonstrations or, indeed, these movements, are characterized by bodies that come together to make a claim in public space, but that formulation presumes that public space is given, that it is already public, and recognized as such. We miss something of the point of public demonstrations, if we fail to see that the very public character of the space is being disputed and even fought over when these crowds gather. Of course, this produces a quandary. We cannot act without supports, and yet we must struggle for the supports that allow us to act. For politics to take place, the body must appear.

Global Internet Expansion: Who Will Lead the Way? [INFOGRAPHIC]According to recent Cisco research, global Internet traffic will grow nearly four-fold from 2010 -- 2015. However, that increase in traffic won’t be dominated by one region. How much will each region contribute to the worldwide traffic expansion? Just by sheer population size alone, one could assume that the Asia-Pacific region would lead in Internet traffic growth. The infographic below provides an interesting visual projection of what Internet usage will look like in 2015. Tags: 2015, infographic, internet traffic

Pepper-spray cop works his way through art history - Arts PostPosted at 09:13 AM ET, 11/21/2011 Nov 21, 2011 02:13 PM EST TheWashingtonPost Lt. On Friday, Pike casually pepper-sprayed protesters in a video that quickly went viral. Over the weekend, Pike’s visage popped up in Photoshopped into other scenes of languid passivity, such as Edouard Manet’s “Le Dejeuner sur l’Herbe” (The Luncheon on the Grass) pictured above. Archibald Willard’s “The Spirit of ‘76” has a new addition. The images are a cheeky way of fighting back against what students say was an unwarranted use of forceful policing tactics. Online, the damage to his and the university’s reputations may already be done: Kennicott says the video will be among the defining imagery of the movement. Though there are dozens of variations on the pepper-spray cop meme — some inserting him into patriotic moments in history, while others are just mash-ups with other memes — the images of Pike in paintings are effective hyperbole for illustrating his nonchalance in pepper-spraying quiescent protesters.

Loser Generated Content: From Participation to Exploitation | PetersenIn this article [1] some of the critical aspects of Web 2.0 are mapped in relation to labor and the production of user generated content. For many years the Internet was considered an apt technology for subversion of capitalism by the Italian post–Marxists. What we have witnessed, however, is that the Internet functions as a double–edged sword; the infrastructure does foster democracy, participation, joy, creativity and sometimes creates zones of piracy. But, at the same time, it has become evident how this same infrastructure also enables companies easily to piggyback on user generated content. A Great Cities Initiative of the University of Illinois at Chicago University Library.

2011 SeptemberLatest Research in Wearable Technology: Video Demos and Abstracts Some of the latest research applications in wearable and ubiquitous technology were submitted and presented at EMBC’s UnConference this year. All entries submitted a project abstract and many have included a short demo video illustrating the research and technology in action. The videos provide a real insight into some of the emerging applications in wearable technology from integrating sensors in textiles, mobile phone based sensing, non invasive cardiovascular reactivity measurement, and body worn monitoring tailored to a range of domains. Awards were presented to Nizan Fridman for ‘MusicGlove: A Music-Based Device for Hand Rehabilitation and Quantitative Assessment of Hand Function’ for the most innovative demo, and to Virg Bento for ‘The SWORD ambulatory rehabilitation system’ for the highest potential impact demos. The pieces are falling into place for an “internet of things” From GigaOM: More info here. More info here.

Steve Jobs 1955-2011. | DARC – Digital Aesthetics Research CenterNewspapers and gadget magazines are overflowing with praise and remembrance, and there is no doubt that one of the big IT company leaders and visionaries has died. In many places he is praised as an aesthete that made computers and gadgets with stunning design and great wow-factor. This is of course true, but in DARC we should remember him for how he made new IT-formats or genres popular like the PC with graphical user interface (which Apple didn’t invent but popularized), the iPod and the iPhone. Also it is significant that especially the success of the iPhone is built on culture and cultural consumption, both in the way that it integrates the musical culture of the iPod and iTunes and in the way it extend it to software culture, which it has transformed into a mobile app-culture. The iPhone and other IOS devices are cultural interfaces and cultural computing – and this is what made it different from the more engineering driven visions of e.g.

Mozilla asks users to join ‘Stop SOPA & PIPA’ campaignThe end of the Internet as we know it may be right around the corner — but not if the Mozilla Foundation has anything to say about it. The maker of Firefox, a non-profit organization, has launched a campaign to help block the passage of both the ‘Stop Online Piracy Act’ (SOPA) and the ‘Protect IP Act’ (PIPA), each of which may soon go up for a vote in Congress. Those who join the campaign are asked to call their senators and representatives and express their ardent opposition to these bills by this Tuesday. What are SOPA and PIPA, anyway? Both PIPA and SOPA aim to crack down on websites that illegally distribute copyrighted material, like movies, songs and TV shows, just as the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) tried to accomplish in the past. Supporters and critics Other possible consequences of SOPA and PIPA Conclusion In short: SOPA and PIPA would likely do little to achieve their explicit goals of curbing online piracy. Watch an in-depth video explanation of PIPA

PEPPER SPRAYING COP"God. I was just out trying to find a mini mart that was open past 10pm and ran into these friggin’ trigger happy lobsterbacks! Don’t shoot me because I get a hankering for Hostess fruit pies after hours. You know, if Boston wasn’t so stupid about everything shutting down at 10pm this would never be happeningAUUAHHAGGAGGAGAGHGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH" "I got back from the fortune teller and she was talking about how in the future stick men are going to fly around in cardboard boxes and talk through their minds. YEAH RIGHT. "This corridor is ever so unpleasant. "Dude, are you nuts?

Interactivity is Evil! A critical investigation of Web 2.0 | JarrettCentral to Web 2.0 is the requirement for interactive systems to enable the participation of users in production and social interaction. Consequently, in order to critically explore the Web 2.0 phenomenon it is important to explore the relationship of interactivity to social power. This study firstly characterises interactivity in these media using Barry’s (2001) framework differentiating interactivity from disciplining technologies as defined by Foucault. Contrary to Barry’s model though, the analysis goes on to explore how interactivity may indeed function as a disciplining technology within the framework of a neoliberal political economy. Table 1 Interactivity and Web 2.0 These ‘non–disciplinary’ features of interactivity can be readily traced within the participatory media of Web 2.0. A Great Cities Initiative of the University of Illinois at Chicago University Library.

Electric Imp Takes the ‘Internet of Things’ MainstreamFrom Fellow Geek: Today a new startup came out of stealth mode. Called Electric Imp, they have developed a line of products designed to connect anything and everything together. and they might finally take the internet of things into the mainstream. Electric Imp sells a series of small microcomputers that resemble SD cards. In them is a Wifi antennae and a processor. You plug them into other circuits that Electric Imp also sells, which do various things. By breaking the processing out of the sensors, you get a product that can be built to do whatever it is you desire. Everything is controlled from the cloud by a drag-and-drop interface. Don’t really care about networking your Christmas lights to the light level? But how do you connect the Imp to the network in the first place? I’m still not convinced that the internet of things will take off. But if any product is going to make it mainstream, it would be the Electric Imp. You can learn more at their website www.electricimp.com. Like this:

Twitter PsychologyPsychological research on Twitter reveals who tweets, how much, what they talk about and why. There are now 190 million Twitter users around the world producing 65 million tweets each day. 19% of US internet users now say they use Twitter or a similar service to share updates about themselves—double the figure from the previous year (Pew, 2009). So who tweets? Why? What are they talking about? And what is so engaging about all those little textual transmissions? Since Twitter didn’t exist until 2006, psychologists have had little chance to explore it, but some of the early research suggests a social network unlike those that came before. Before we get onto the research, though, here’s a quick intro for Twitter newbies: What is Twitter? Twitter is a cross between a social network and a blog. The video above shows you what it looks like on a mobile phone. 1. But Twitter doesn’t always feel like a conversation as people use it in different ways. 2. 3. 4. 5. 7. 8. 9.